Ty Majeski outdueled a dominant Derek Thorn to score the victory in the 53rd Annual Snowball Derby at Five Flags Speedway on Sunday.
Majeski passed Derek Thorn with 23 laps to go and then held him off on the restart in the closing laps. The two drivers raced side-by-side in a physical battle for the lead in the final five laps before Majeski ultimately cleared Thorn to take sole possession of the lead to take the win – his first in Super Late Model racing’s most prestigious race.
“I can’t even describe it man, this is so cool,” Majeski said in victory lane. “What a crowd here. Thank you for coming out. That was cool. That was an awesome race with Derek. I have so much respect for him. He’s such a great racecar driver. I was little worried after that first run, fell back a little bit. We made great adjustments all day and put ourselves in position at the end.”
Majeski’s win came two weeks after he won the South Carolina 400 Late Model Stock Car race at Florence Motor Speedway, repeating a feat accomplished Christian Eckes in 2016 who won the Derby weeks after winning the Myrtle Beach 400, the event the South Carolina 400 at Florence replaced.
Thorn went on to finish second while Chase Elliott, Chandler Smith and Kaden Honeycutt rounded out the top-five.
“I’m proud of these guys, we had a good car all day. We gave it up on the last competition caution that came out there, he snuck by me with one to go,” Thorn said. “He had the track position and wasn’t afraid to use the front bumper to keep us out of the way. We’ll keep at it and hope more luck can come our way.”
He scored the pole for the second year in a row and will spend another year wondering what if.
“Oh yeah, I’ll play those laps back in my mind for the next 365 days.”
Stephen Nasse, who was stripped of a win both last night in the Snowflake 100 and in last year’s Snowball Derby, fell out of the race with an alternator problem after running second much of the race. Bubba Pollard also dropped out of the race early in his debut for TK Racing and VanDoorn Racing Development.
2020 SNOWBALL DERBY
- Ty Majeski
- Derek Thorn
- Chase Elliott
- Chandler Smith
- Kaden Honeycutt
- Cole Butcher
- Kyle Busch
- Grant Enfinger
- Derek Griffith
- Kyle Plott
- Corey Heim
- Jeremy Doss
- Travis Braden
- Daniel Dye
- Derek Kraus
- Cayden Lapcevich
- Jeremy Pate
- John DeAngelis
- Matt Craig
- Paul Shafer, Jr.
- Augie Grill
- Kyle Sieg
- Ross Kenseth
- Jake Garcia
- Boris Jurkovic
- Dan Fredrickson
- Jesse Dutilly
- Casey Roderick
- Stephen Nasse
- Michael Atwell
- Hunter Robbins
- Chris Davidson
- Preston Peltier
- Bubba Pollard
- Logan Boyett
- Mason Diaz
Marquis comes from St. Charles, Maryland and has a widespread background in journalism, having covered politics in Washington and Maryland as well as nearly every form of auto racing, including NASCAR, IndyCar, AMA Motocross and IHRA Drag Racing. Now living near Emerald Isle, North Carolina, Marquis covers Late Model Stock Cars and Super Late Models in the Carolinas and Virginia.
Bill Towers
December 7, 2020 at 9:54 pm
Who cares its asphalt racing. Ride ride ride, last lap SLAM